245

Pakistan Economic and Social Review

Volume 44, No. 2 (Winter 2006), pp. 245-258

COMMUNITY MOBILIZATION THROUGH

PARTICIPATORY APPROACH
A Critical Assessment
ABDUL RASHID KHAN*

Abstract. This study critically evaluates the effectiveness of participatory

strategy in mobilizing community for utilizing the services of development
project in the tribal and feudal structure of Nasirabad area of Balochistan. The
community development, which is an important component of pat feeder
command area project, is analyzed in the light of research questions such as to
what extent the project has been successful in mobilizing community for
development and what factors have badly affected the participatory strategy of
project and what are its policy implications. The data used in the study is based
on both survey data and project documents, simple statistical methods like mean,
standard deviation and coefficient of variance were applied. The major findings
include that project has been partially successful in motivating the community
towards exploiting the project resources while most of the community
organizations remained unsuccessful. It was also found out that the community
organizations would not remain sustainable due to institutional and financial
problems, therefore, changes are needed in the participatory approach in the tribal
structure of Balochistan.

I. INTRODUCTION
Community participation has become one of the important features of new
development paradigm. Most of the poverty alleviation projects especially
designed by World Bank and Asian Development Bank entail involving the
beneficiaries in the designing, implementing and monitoring of development
projects. However, the potential benefits attached with participatory
approach are controversial. The review of literature, to a greater extent,

*The author is Assistant Professor of Economics at Department of Commerce, University of

Balochistan, Quetta (Pakistan).
246 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

confirms the results of effective participation in the form of empowerment of

communities, social capital and sustainability of the projects (World Bank,
2000). Moreover, regional specific irrigation projects in Pakistan also
claimed the benefits of formation of farmer organizations in the form of
greater efficiency, mobilization of social and cash resources. There is enough
evidence to show that the performance of the government-managed system is
less effective than that of farmer-managed system.
On the other hand, there is some empirical cross-country evidence
denying the effectiveness of community organization at targeting the poor
due to feudal and elite dominance. The same approach is also criticized for
being slow and complex process (Mansuri and Rao, 2004).
Since pat feeder command area development project has been completed
in the area where the feudal class is still dominant and where the community
is heterogeneous both in terms of assets and social powers, the benefits and
costs of community mobilization can be easily tested for determining the
effectiveness of participatory approach.
The overall objective of this paper is to assess the effectiveness of
participatory approach in community development of project area. The main
question, which will be discussed, is whether the project has strengthened the
capacity of community organizations by providing the required inputs from
the project such as creation of awareness, skills and knowledge through
training. The other subsidiary questions include: Did participation of
Agricultural Development Groups (ADGs) members in development process
increase as visualized? Did it increase the capacity for making collective
decisions independently? Did it improve the accessibility and efficiency of
community? To what extent the community organizations will remain viable.

II. DATA AND METHODS OF ANALYSIS

Data used in this paper were mainly drawn from the survey conducted for
M. Phil. thesis. The tools used to get primary data in the survey include
questionnaire, observation guide and discussion with key informants.
Whereas secondary source of data was based on project documents,
government reports and other related literature review.
Effectiveness of community organization is evaluated both in qualitative
and quantitative indicators like capacity building, participation and
empowerment. The efficiency of community network can be detected
through changes in knowledge about community affairs. The simplest way to
quantify such knowledge is to use set of binary yes/no questions. In this
regard, certain dichotomous questions were asked. The results related to
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 247

community development were assessed in such a way as to see its

implications for participatory approach.
Data analysis is carried out both at the project and distributory level.
Data were organized and presented both in tabular and graphic form.
Appropriate descriptive methods have been applied for data analysis.
Descriptive tools include measure of central tendency, dispersions,
proportions and frequency distribution.

III. PROJECT’S VERSION OF PARTICIPATORY APPROACH

Before going to analyze the project efforts at strengthening community
organizations in the light of above questions, it should be noted that prior to
intervention, the common farmers had no representation or social partici-
pation in any village level organization. There was no formal community
organization. The feudal class dominated the organizations/institutions such
as cooperative societies and water users associations. It was, therefore,
decided by the project to organize the new community organizations on the
basis of self-help for collective actions. The community was organized on
the premise that the local communities are the best protectors of their
interest; therefore, they should be grouped so that they can play effective role
in the development process of project area. These organizations were formed
in different groups like ADGs, Women Development Group and Water Users
Association both at village and minor level. These root level organizations
were supposed to play effective role in the whole service delivery system
(agricultural technology, socio-economic infrastructure, credit and saving
services).
The project strongly believed that reaching the poor through building
capacity of community members is the only way to get them out of vicious
cycle of poverty. In this regard, participatory approach was adopted. The
mechanism was designed in a way that the communities should not be
passive recipients rather be active partners of development process. On the
basis of self-help, communities were supposed to contribute both manually
and financially in utilizing of project resources. For example, community
groups had to pay some portion of cost contribution in the form of labour and
material on constructions of water channels and user services for artificial
insemination of livestock etc. In other areas like giving training, selecting
sites and monitoring the project, the participatory manner was encouraged.
The other objectives of participatory approach were to develop a sense
of greater ownership, better implementation and empowerment of
248 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

community which were severely lacking due to high rate of illiteracy and
strong hold of feudal structure in the area.
Besides in case of micro credit, pro-poor policy was adopted so that the
feudal/big landlords could have little interest to take part in the activities of
credit mobilization. The amount of loan was so meager that could not attract
the big farmers to participate in loan activities.
In view of the above background, let us examine the selected
performance indicators of community development.

PERFORMANCE INDICATORS OF COMMUNITY

DEVELOPMENT
Community development can be assessed both by qualitative and
quantitative indicators. Some of the important indicators against which the
project affects on community’s performance are evaluated as under:

1. Capacity Building of ADGs

The effectiveness of community organizations can be assessed by applying
the criteria of capacity building which may be generally defined as the
process by which individuals, institutions and societies acquire knowledge
and develop ability to better perform functions. Building the capacity of
organizations is critical for effective poverty reduction as it helps the poor to
exploit opportunities within their communities and develop links with
external departments.
As regards the issue of capacity building of community in the study
area, the project documents confirm that the project management as per
targets has achieved the desired quantitative results. The review of results
regarding formation of ADGs and the time and frequency of training bring
out the satisfactory picture as illustrated in Figure 1.
The dynamic analysis of project efforts in enhancing capacity building
of ADG members reveal that the tempo of group formation was very slow in
its early years despite the fact that training was demand driven as it was
provided on the desire and needs of beneficiaries. The overall frequency of
training in different activities is low with the exception of Agricultural
Technology and On Farm Water Management practices (OFWM). The skills
and knowledge provided in agriculture and livestock is evident from their
performance. The overall adoption rate both in agriculture and livestock is
impressive which means that project succeeded in strengthening the capacity
of farmers for utilizing the project resources.
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 249

FIGURE 1
Formation of Water User Association

Source: Agriculture and Cooperatives Department, Pat Feeder Command Area

Development Project, Agriculture Extension, Dera Murad Jamali.
The effectiveness of community network, which is an important element
of capacity building, can also be detected through changes in knowledge.
Sets of binary questions were asked from the sample members of ADGs. The
results shown in Table 1 reveal that the project has considerately improved
the level of knowledge on all selected indicators which has greater
implication for capacity development of organization as it keeps the
institutional process more transparent.
TABLE 1
Indicators Related to Farmers’ Knowledge about Community Organization
Respondents (Frequency)
Indicators
Yes No Total
Knowledge of bylaws 193 63 253
Transparency in accounts 257 23 280
Record maintenance 408 18 426
Record checked 406 18 424
Source: Survey Results (2002).

2. Level of Participation in Development

Effective participation of community organizations in the development
process is prerequisite for improving the prospects of project. Through
250 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

participation, ownership and responsibility are transferred to the beneficiaries

and in doing so they are empowered (World Bank, 1996). The higher
participation ensures viability of organizations especially in a situation where
community members are highly heterogeneous both in terms of assets and
ethnicity.
The results regarding participation of farmers in all phases of project
cycle present divergent output. The participation results indicate that
gradually the community involvement declined in the project cycle. The
degree of participation in identification phase and site selection of water
channels was significant but in the implementation phase it was found poor.
Similarly participation was also found significant in case of direct interest.
For example, the attendance of members was usually found to be hired at the
time of loan disbursement. On average only 33 percent of ADG’s farmers
had full participation in the whole process of project development from
identification, selection, designing and implementation due to poor
performance of NGO and line departments specially in the initial years of
project implementation. Besides, the spirit of self-help has also not been
properly inculcated among the community members for the reasons of poor
training and supervision by the project staff.
Similarly level of participation in the meetings was also found low
(50%) badly affecting the functionality of the community organization. The
immediate effects of poor participation coming out are that community has
been found weak to undertake their development activities and get reach to
the resources of project. Another effect of poor participation is that the ADG
members have low level of awareness as how to practice the organizational
rules.

3. Ability to Make Decisions Independently

Taking decisions independently is another sign of community empowerment.
On average, in 68 cases decisions were not influenced by political or tribal
leaders, which means that in majority cases decisions without outside
interference and dictations have been made. Normally decisions making is
processed in a systematic way about development issues. First, they openly
discuss then after consensus development, they make decisions in a
democratic way, such a mode of decisions give them confidence to take the
initiative to improve their circumstances. They were found more vocal in
expressing their desires for education and health facilities. While in the
remaining cases, tribal leaders/big landlords directly and indirectly influence
their decisions. Based on this result, it may be said that decision making
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 251

without interference of tribal elite is an indicator of change which means that

the community members by and large are getting free from the grip of
exploitative forces.

4. Conflict Management
Conflict arising is a common phenomena in any working system due to
interest clash among the community members. Normally conflict arises over
water distribution, water theft, warabundi, misuse of fund, crop theft, refusal
to contribute to fund rising. Most of the times these conflicts/disputes are
resolved by the leadership of ADGs and WUA occurred among the
community members. In some cases, conflicts/grievances are resolved by
tribal chiefs or project staffs.
Generally mechanism to resolve conflict is built-in tribal set up. The
tribal chiefs and elders of the community as per the traditions of area resolve
the disputes. However, with the formation of ADGs, the traditional source of
conflict management has become weaker. Now they are playing active role
in the resolution of disputes.
Improved social interaction among community members is an important
index of effective community organizations. Community based projects are
evaluated in terms of externalities. If positive social externalities in the form
of better gender relation, unity and cooperation are the outcome of project
then such intervention is considered successful.
The perception of farmers about social interaction was found positive as
is evident from the following figures. A majority of respondents (60%) is of
the opinion that it created unity. Similarly, tolerance and collective working
spirit are the other outcomes of community organizations accounting 25
percent and 15 percent respectively. However, 10 percent are of the opinion
that a community organization is the source of conflict among the
community members because they do not target the supremacy of leaders
due to jealousy.

5. Linkages of Farmers with Different Departments of Government

Institutions and Private Centres
Strong linkages between government institutions and farmers are important
for agricultural development. The policies of institutions like agriculture
research institutes, extension services and capacities of farmers are directly
related. Construction of successful interaction with government agencies and
technical expert improve the working relationship, which in turn increases
organizational capacity of community.
252 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

The overall results regarding linkages are disappointing. Only 15 percent

respondents consider this interaction satisfactory. While a majority (74%) is
of the view that it is to some extent satisfactory. While probing the reasons, it
was come out that the large and influential farmers utilize the extension
services in a better way. They get technical knowledge and other project
services in more quantity than the small farmers due to their influence over
the project staff. The negative implications of poor linkages with these
institutions have been found small farmers who need to be capacitated in
terms of education/information.

6. Fund Raising Ability

The effectiveness of community organization especially in irrigation project
can be assessed by its ability to raise financial resources. The fund generation
is required within the community members not only for the repair and
maintenance of watercourses but also for undertaking any collective activity.
Moreover, fund raising through cost recovery provides an alternative
operational and maintenance strategy which is necessary for sustainability of
project.
The results on this issue are discouraging. More than 62 percent ADGs
have raised no funds due to poor motivation and unwillingness of
community members. The factors are three folds:
(i) The reason for poor ability to raise the fund lies in the psyche of
community who used to avoid paying user fee for public services.
They used to receive public services with low prices (subsidy) or
without any payment. In other words, they have receiving mentality
which is widely prevalent in the tribal set up. This type of attitude
could not be changed within project period. It needs long time
institutional change with strong baking of government.
(ii) The target groups were not involved in the stage of planning due to
which they seem to be not convinced to share the cost of services.
(iii) The purchasing power of poor farmers did not allow them to share
the burden of cost of resources.
Assessing the performance of community organization on the basis of
different criteria, capacity building, participation empowerment and
accessibility, it may be pointed out that the potential role of community
visualized by the project was not realized to the full extent. Indicators related
to community organization show slow progress, which implies that the
intended empowering effects did not come out as a result of poor
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 253

implementation of participatory approach. Similarly variations on selected

indicators (5.2%) reveal a wide range disparity which shows that
effectiveness of community development indicators are not consistent. Most
of them have below performance. This also implies that some ADGs are
successful while some ADGs performance is not satisfactory.
TABLE 2
Comparison of the Performance Indicators of Community Development
Mean Standard Coefficient of
Indicators
% Deviation Variance %
Participation in Meeting 56 13.69 54.76
Participation in Development 25 13.59 45
Process
Cash Mobilization Ability 50 40.00 80
Conflict Management 33.3 18.86 56.58
Linkage with Government Deptt. 50
Ability to Make Decision 25 44.90 99.6
Independently
Awareness 50 12.51 25
Perception About Social Change 27.5 17.41 63.31
Source: Survey Results (2002).

FACTORS ADVERSELY AFFECTING THE EFFECTIVENESS

OF COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION IN THE STUDY AREA
The question arises why participatory approach could not bring out the
desired results. The reasons for poor performance of community
organizations can be attributed to the following factors:
(i) Poor social mobilization
(ii) Tribal affiliations
(iii) Lack of regular monitoring and evaluation
(iv) Non-realization of NGOs role
(v) Lack of narrow targeting

1. Poor Social Mobilization

One of the reasons for poor performance of community organization is that
the project could not motivate the community to fully participate in process
of development. The project staff has not experience about the conditions of
254 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

poor communities organized swiftly without motivating them. Rushing to

help the poor through participation may be self-defeating unless institutional
capacity of poor is developed (World Bank, 2004). In fact, lack of
organizational skills and lack of ownership have been found limiting factors.
If the development of community organization work was conducted by NGO
it would have brought positive results. The experiences of different
community based projects also confirm the positive results of NGOs’
participation in social mobilizing of people (Evans and Bataillc, 1997).
Capability approach by noble winner, Amertya Sen calls for partnership
among government, NGOs and community organization which is missing in
the instant case. Generally there is mistrust between government and NGOs
in the province due to their conflicting approach. The need arises to create
and strengthen NGO government collaboration by creating new organiza-
tional framework that could facilitate interaction between government, NGO
and CBOs, for example, Balochistan trial management where different actors
of development are working amicably.
Only in the area of micro credit, the role of NGO (Taraquee Trust) is
evident for community mobilization. What is more important is that the role
of community group is itself important for social mobilization provided
groups are enthusiastic about the targets of project. The creation of desire
and ambition among community members is a long-term process which can
be consolidated with strong motivation.

2. Tribal Affiliations
Tribal and inter tribal relations determine their social, political and economic
behaviour of people in the study area. Population is ethnically diverse with
the presence of numerous tribes, sub tribes and clans. Clashes and conflicts
between them are still existent (Ahmad, 2003).
Though the beneficiaries now recognize that through formation of
project-sponsored groups, they have been provided with a forum to sit
together and resolve their disputes and differences amicably. The new
organizational structure in the form of community organization has been
found to be more responsive to the needs of development than the old tribal
structure. However, it was observed that tribal ties and loyalty are still
considered as protective umbrella and majority of people want to resolve
their problems within the framework of tribal structure, so it can be said that
the influence of only viable and strong community organization can dilute
the tribal influence which does not appear to be the reality of ground in near
future.
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 255

3. Lack of Regular Monitoring and Evaluation of Community

Organization
The project due to poor institutional capacity could not properly monitor and
evaluate the performance of community organization. The monitoring and
evaluation strategy used by project is covering only quantitative aspects of
community development such as training level of participation, number of
workshops etc. It did not touch upon the important aspects of capacity
building like sense of ownership, commitment and satisfaction. As a result,
the real feedback on the performance of community organization was not
channeled so the project staff remained ignorant about the real change going
on in the perception and attitude of target groups if monitoring and
evaluation was conducted regularly by professional consultants, the situation
would be quite different. Similarly if participatory approach was adopted by
involving communities in the process, it would have brought out the ground
realities.

4. Lack of Narrow Targeting

Targeting the needy is critical for any poverty alleviation project. The project
must have clear target groups because the problems of different strata of
population are not similar. Moreover, narrowly targeted programme are
prescribed for the reasons of efficiency and flexibility. In the instant project,
benefits are for the entire population of study area. If the project targeted
some of its packages only for the poor it could have more beneficial to
community as a whole. In this regard, NGOs could play a key role in the
implementation of targeting the poor. Conventional wisdom suggests that
NGOs can reach the poor in a cost effective manner as they have experience
doing with poor. When this problem was discussed with the project staff,
they told that in the initial stages of project, it was politically not possible to
identify the poor and then launched special packages for them without the
approval and consent of community leaders of the project area. However,
they hired the services of Balochistan Rural Support Programme, which
could not continue its work in the field due to their internal conflicts and
mistrust among government, NGOs and donor agencies while the other
NGOs in the province were lacking the required institutional capacity.

IV. SUSTAINABILITY OF COMMUNITY GROUPS

In view of the above poor performance, the question arises whether the
community organization will remain sustainable, if not, what will be its
implications for future project strategy regarding participatory approach.
Although sustainability of community organization can be assessed in a
256 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

broader framework, its future viability may be analyzed in terms of financial

and institutional dimensions with available information.
As regards financial sustainability, potential problem regarding sustain-
ability of community organizations may arise due to shortage of money. In
fact, regular sufficient supply of money is cementing factor keeping them
together. Since the project is no more funded by the government nor by any
other agency, it will be a big challenge for any NGO to create financial
resources both from the beneficiaries and the donors with or without the
support of government.
Cost recovery is an important element of project financial sustainability.
The fee to be covered from the use of services is necessary to generate
revenue. The results reveal that cost recovery for both operation and main-
tenance as well as for services of livestock is likely to undermine the long
term project sustainability especially with respect to agriculture technology
because the mechanism devised by project was not followed.
As far as institutional sustainability of community organization is con-
cerned, creating the institutional infrastructure to sustain the project benefits
over the long run is necessary. It is stressed that “unless appropriately
sensitive organizational strategies and channels are subsequently employed
and adequate gestation time provided, the resultant beneficiary will be
vulnerable to distortions and will have limited effectiveness” (World Bank
Report, 1999-2000).
One of the threats to sustainability is fear, apprehensions expressed by
the farmers that without any external institutional support (NGO,
government and donor agencies), the group members might find themselves
at odds with big landlords if the clash of interest in irrigation water due to
share or other productive resources. It has been discussed with some of
members of ADGs that community groups are ineffective for social action
due to tribal differences and infrequent meetings. This trend can be
considered as potential threat for project sustainability because most of the
work is of collective nature. Another threatening factor is poor involvement
of small farmers in the community organizations. Though landless tenants
have been given due consideration while structuring community
organizations, their involvement in the implementation process was not
satisfactory. One probable reason may be that approximately 80 percent of
the ADG members were landowners followed by landless tenants occupying
21 percent. In the long run, it may get worse due to influence of landowners
over local institutions.
 KHAN: Community Mobilization Through Participatory Approach 257

Moreover, some of the ADGs were formed at the later stage of project,
which could not grow on sound ground rather they are considered to be at
infancy stage from capacity point of view. Their chances of survival are also
weak. So it may be deducted that community organizations, which were
supposed to be the future owners of project, have dim prospects to be
sustained.

V. CONCLUSIONS
On the basis of above discussion, it can be concluded that participatory
approach has partially succeeded in mobilizing and strengthening the
community organizations in the project area. If the role of NGO, which is
catalyst in sustainable participatory development, was realized during
implementation, the objectives of community development could be fully
achieved. The effects of project on community development may prove
temporary if alternative development activities will not be started in the
study area. Because the experience of similar project like social action
programme, minor irrigation schemes in the province have proved that unless
follow up efforts of social mobilization of community is conducted, the
communities cannot be kept viable. Moreover, the participatory version of
project in its theoretical framework seems to have been failed in efficient and
effective utilization of community groups. So the policy implication arises to
modify participatory approach in the light of social, political and cultural
ground realities of the tribal structure. In this regard, it may be suggested to
categorize the community for effective targeting before launching any
community based project. In a nutshell, it can be stated that participatory
approach is a long-term process requiring strong support from the
government and donor agencies.
258 Pakistan Economic and Social Review

REFERENCES
Ahmad, Mushtaq (1999), Socio-economic baseline survey of pat feeder
command area of Balochistan.
Arif, S. M. (2003), Impact Evolution Study. PFCADP.
Balochistan Planning and Development Department (1999), Strategy for
Poverty Alleviation.
Belomont Claif Wodsworth, Analyzing social setting: A guide to qualitative
observation and analysis.
Hamid, A. and M. U. Hussain (2001), Need for a well structured social
organization: Methodology for reforming irrigation management.
IUCN (2000), Balochistan Conservation Strategy. Chapters 12 and 14, pp.
183, 203.
Mansuri, Ghazala and Vijayendra Rao (2004), Community based and driven
development: A critical review. The World Bank Research Observer,
Volume 19, p. 39.
PC (1995), Pat Feeder Command Area Development Project.
PFCADP (1993), Project Appraisal Report.
Waheed-uz-Zaman (1998), Impacts of irrigation and drainage development
projects in Pakistan: Farmers’ perspective. The Pakistan Development
Review, Summer 2000, pp. 131-152.
World Bank (1996), The World Bank Participation Source Book, Chapter 1,
pp. 7-8.
World Bank (2000), Entering the 21st Century. World Development Report
1999-2000.
World Bank (2004), Service provision for the poor: Public and private sector
cooperation. Berlin Workshop Series, p. 111.